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Faculty
Carla M. Mathers, Esquire, SC: L has practiced law in Maryland and the District of Columbia since 1993. She currently serves as General Counsel and Legal Program Manager for TCS Associates Interpreting, a prominent sign language interpreting service in Maryland. Ms. Mathers’ law degree is from Howard University School of Law. Ms. Mathers’ interpreting degree is from the College of Southern Idaho. Ms. Mathers sat on the Advisory Group for Language Access to develop standards for language access in courts for the American Bar Association. Ms. Mathers also sat on the Maryland Administrative Office of the Courts’ Advisory Committee on Interpreters Sub-committee on Ethics and Sub-committee on Testing and Training. Ms. Mathers previously served as the Legal Program Coordinator for MARIE Center/DOIT Center at the University of Northern Colorado. She has served as an adjunct instructor for the Gallaudet University Department of Interpretation teaching legal interpreting, among other courses. She served as Vice President for the Conference of Interpreter Trainers and sat on the Board of Directors for the Deaf Abused Women’s Network in Washington, D.C. Ms. Mathers is the author of Sign Language Interpreters in Court: Understanding Best Practices, a text for interpreters, attorneys and courts to understand the principles underlying ASL court interpreting.
Sandy Peplinski, BS, CI, CT, SC:L, QMHI has been an interpreter for the past 25 years. Having deaf parents allows her to have a strong ties to the deaf community, a deep understanding of deaf culture and the communication struggles deaf individuals face on a daily basis. In her work as a community interpreter, she specializes in legal and mental health interpreting. Sandy has a background in deaf education, attending the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She also attended the Interpreter Training Program at said university. She has completed the training and is registered to provide interpreting services through the Wisconsin Emergency Assistance Volunteer Registry (WEAVR). She is the first recipient of the Outstanding Interpreter Award (2017) from the Wisconsin Association of the Deaf for her work in the deaf community.
Being a mentor to interpreters wanting to improve their skills, both on a general basis, along with skills needed to work in legal settings gives her an opportunity help improve the quality of interpreting within the community. She is a guest lecturer at the Interpreter Training Program at UWM-Milwaukee, as well as participating in evaluating progress of students in the ITP. Along with Lisa Perry Burckhardt, a certified deaf interpreter, she is one of the interpreting teams in the 2014 NCIEC video, Highly Effective Court Interpreting Teams in Action, which is used for training interpreters to work in legal environments. Sandy is a strong advocate for the use of certified deaf interpreters and is heavily involved in mentoring deaf interpreters to become certified. Working in deaf/hearing teams constitutes a large portion of her work. Sandy has been a co-instructor, along with Stephanie Kerkvliet and Lisa Perry Burckhardt, during the initial series of the Legal Interpreter Training Institute (LITI) and looks forward to the next cohort experience.
Lisa Perry Burckhardt, CDI, CLIP-R
Lisa Perry Burckhardt is currently working for Sorenson Communication in a position as National Education and Training Program Manager specializing in training and mentoring. In addition to the role as program manager, she presents numerous workshop including Legal in VRS, Cultural Mediation, and more and manages Language Mentoring Program to foster quality and skills of Video Relay Interpreters. Starting in 1997, after Ms. Perry Burckhardt completed the Interpreting Training Program at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, she worked as a full time Mentor Program Coordinator and Certified Deaf Interpreter for Professional Interpreting Enterprise (PIE) in Greenfield, WI. Lisa maintains her working relationship with PIE as a part time interpreter. Lisa has been awarded the Certified Deaf Interpreter and Certificate Legal Interpreter Provisional – Relay (CLIP-R) credentials through the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf and has been certified since 1996. Her work with PIE has provided countless hours of experiences interpreting in numerous settings, heavily focused on Legal, Mental Health and Medical. Lisa’s legal foundation was through taking the Legal Interpreter training series provided by Carla Mathers. As a trainer, Lisa has been involved with Wisconsin Interpreter/Translator Court committee forum in preparation of orientation training. In addition, Lisa continued her commitment as a trainer by providing Legal Interpreter Training Institute series in Wisconsin provided through Professional Interpreting Enterprise. Additionally, Lisa participated in train the trainer series with NCIEC focusing on CDI in Legal settings and Legal Interpreter training modules.
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